Israel tops the list of the world’s most militarized nations, according to the latest Global Militarisation Index released Tuesday by the Bonn International Centre for Conversion (BICC).

At number 34, Israel’s main regional rival, Iran, is far behind. Indeed, every other Near Eastern country, with the exceptions of Yemen (37) and Qatar (43), is more heavily militarized than the Islamic Republic, according to the Index, whose research is funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Co-operation and Development.

Singapore ranks second, followed by Syria, Russia, Jordan, and Cyprus, according to the Index, which is based on a number of weighted variables, such as the comparison of a country’s military budget with its gross domestic product (GDP), and the percentage of the GDP it spends on health care.

Six of the top 10 states, including Israel (1), Syria (4), Jordan (5), Kuwait (7), Bahrain (9), and Saudi Arabia (10) are located in the Middle East, while yet another of Iran’s neighbours, Azerbaijan, made its first entry into the militarized elite at number 8.

The former Soviet Caucasian state has used its vast oil wealth, which has placed it among the fastest growing economies in the world, to buy expensive weapons systems in recent years, apparently as leverage to press Armenia (23) into returning the disputed Nagorno-Kharabovsk enclave which Baku lost in a brief but bloody war after the Soviet Union’s collapse.

Bahrain’s placement in the top 10 was also a first for the Sunni-dominated kingdom which has been backed by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) in an increasingly violent effort to suppress demands by the Shi’ite majority for democratic reform.

While the Middle East is far more militarised than any other region – all of its countries rank within the top 40 – Southeast Asia, led by Singapore, appears ascendant, according to Jan Grebe, the Index’s head researcher who directs BICC’s work in the field of arms export control.

In addition to Singapore, China (82) and India (71) are increasing their defence budgets at a relatively rapid rate, while the recent flaring of territorial conflicts between Beijing and its neighbours across the South and East China Seas will likely amplify voices within those countries for defence build-ups.

“It remains to be seen how this development will affect the degree of militarization of individual states and the entire region,” Grebe said.

In contrast, both sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America are relatively low on the Index, which covers statistics for 2011 and ranked 135 countries altogether.

At number 30, Angola was a notable African exception, while Chile (31), Ecuador (36), and Colombia (38) topped the Latin American list. By contrast, Brazil, which has by far the largest defence budget in the region, ranked 76.

Among those excluded from the Index was North Korea, whose defense budget has proved impervious to independent analysts and which is widely thought to be one of the world’s most militarized states, if not the most. Eritrea, another state that has made it into the top 10 in the past, also was not included this year.

Created in 1996, the GMI, which has been updated each year, tries to assess the balance between militarization and human development, particularly related to health.

In addition to BICC’s own research, data published by the Stockholm Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Health Organisation (WHO), and the Institute for Strategic Studies are used to compile the Index, whose rankings go back to 1990 at the end of the Cold War.

In addition to the comparison of military budgets, GDP, and health expenditures, the Index uses several other variables, including the total personnel in the paramilitary and military forces – albeit not the police – and total number of physicians vis-à-vis the overall population, and the ratio of the number of heavy weapons to the total population.

Each variable is given a certain score which is then “weighted” according to a set formula to determine a total quantitative score. The more militarized a country, the higher the score. South Korea which, for many years, ranked in the top 10, fell to 18 this year.

Eritrea, which fought a bitter war with Ethiopia and repeatedly cracked down hard against internal dissent, gained a “perfect” 1,000 score in 2004, the first of a three-year reign atop the list.

But Israel, which has carried out a 45-year occupation of Palestinian lands and Syrian territory, has topped the list for almost all of the last 20 years. On the latest Index, its score came to 877, 70 points ahead of Singapore, which has been number two for every year this century, except for the three in which Eritrea was number one.

Significantly, Greece ranked 14 on the list, the highest of any NATO country, far ahead of its regional rival, Turkey, which took the 24th slot, and Bulgaria (25).

The two countries with the world’s largest defense budgets, the United States and China, ranked 29 (591) and 82 (414), respectively.

In addition to the six Middle Eastern states in the top, Oman (11), the UAE (13), Lebanon (17), Iraq (26), and Egypt (28) were all found to be more militarized than Iran, which is currently subject to unprecedented economic sanctions imposed primarily by the West which accuses it of pursuing a nuclear program that may have military applications.

The concentration of so many Middle Eastern states at the top underscores the degree to which the region has become a powder keg.

If the Middle East dominates the top ranks, sub-Saharan African states, with just a few exceptions, lie at the low end of scale. The region’s biggest economy, South Africa, ranks 98, while its most populous nation, Nigeria, stands at 117.

Too little militarization carries its own risks, according to Grebe, because states may not be able to guarantee order or even territorial integrity.

“This situation points to the seemingly paradoxical phenomenon that some state security apparatuses are incapable of preventing violence and conflict simply because the country concerned shows a degree of militarization which is too low,” he said.

Retired General Amos Yadlin, a former head of Israeli military intelligence: “A gradual military intervention along the lines of the Libyan model of a Western aerial campaign seems the most effective response to the Syrian crisis.”

Amos Yadlin: Only bombing Assad’s forces will stop the slaughter nowIt need not become ‘another Iraq’ and the Syrian military challenge can be met. Indeed, examination indicates that six arguments propounded by opponents of Western military intervention do not hold much water, and instead suggests that Western inaction is likely to hasten the very scenario that opponents of military intervention seek to avoid.First, Syria need not become “another Iraq”. Those who resist intervention warn that military intervention might end in the West becoming mired in another Muslim country, on the heels of the unsuccessful Afghan and Iraqi experiences.

This argument belittles the West’s successful experience in Kosovo 20 years ago and in Libya in 2011, where intensive airpower removed Gaddafi, stopped the bloodbath, and enabled democratic elections.Moreover, a military intervention need not involve a ground invasion or even peacekeeping forces – which, in any case, would have little influence on Assad. The recommended model, built on the lessons of Iraq, is a Western aerial campaign that paves the way for regime change, as it did in Kosovo and in Libya. There are no “boots on the ground”, at least initially (and should that become necessary, Turkish forces should be assigned to this mission).

The suggested strategy in Syria is to use gradual steps to convince Assad that an international campaign is a credible option: from moving aircraft carriers to the region and Turkish ground forces to the border, to reconnaissance sorties, no-fly zones, and humanitarian corridors.Second, the Syrian military challenge can be met. Another argument postulates that the Syrian military presents a bigger threat to Western militaries than those confronted in Iraq and Libya. The Syrian defensive capability is not dramatically greater than Iraq’s of 1991 or 2003, which already included advanced Russian systems. As the Syrian military has been preoccupied with internal uprisings over the past year and a half, it is likely that its capabilities have even eroded.

Therefore, those who doubt the West’s capacity to face the current Syrian defence ignore the fact that Western power was built to cope with much greater challenges.Third, the lack of international consensus cannot justify passivity. Those who call for passivity in Syria claim that since there is no consensus among members of the UN Security Council and no explicit Arab League request, there is no legitimacy for foreign military intervention. These arguments ignore the moral obligation − the “Responsibility to Protect” principle − endorsed by the West. Finally, action in Syria might support the international campaign against Iran.

Those who oppose intervening contend that it would increase Middle East tensions, move Iran out of the international focus, and sharpen the rift between Russia and China and the other members of the P5+1 who lead the negotiations with Tehran.Acting in Syria however, could weaken, if not break, the nexus between Iran, Syria, Hezbollah, and Palestinian terror organisations, and therefore likely contain Iranian influence in the Levant. This would have a dramatic impact on the balance of power between radical and pragmatic forces in the region. And it would signal to Iran the West’s resolve to back up its interests and threats with force.

A gradual military intervention along the lines of the Libyan model of a Western aerial campaign seems the most effective response to the Syrian crisis. Only if Assad assesses that Western intervention is a real threat might he abdicate and make room for leadership with better prospects for halting the violence. The West must not let unfounded fears guide its policy while atrocities in Syria continue.Amos Yadlin is Executive Director of the Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University and former Head of Military Intelligence of the Israeli Defence Forces

Most observers have become wearied by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s frequently voiced demands that Iran must be attacked because it is a threat to the entire world. The reality is otherwise, that Iran’s theocratic government’s security apparatus oppresses mostly its own people and its military lacks the capabilities that would enable it to threaten either Israel or the United States. Israel’s government knows that perfectly well and has even conceded that Iran currently has no nuclear weapons program, a viewpoint shared by America’s CIA.

It also knows that any attempt by its air force and navy to attack Iran would be fraught with peril, quite likely leading to a regional war in which Israel would sustain considerable damage even if it would ultimately prevail due to its superior armaments provided by the United States.

So if Iran is no threat and Israel is incapable of staging a successful attack using its own resources, why is there a constant drumbeat from Netanyahu? One might suggest that Israel has been all along intending to let Washington do the fighting and dying for it by creating a sense of urgency over what Iran’s intentions and capabilities might actually be. Useful idiots in Congress, most recently Senators Kirk and Menendez, continue to push through resolutions demanding more and harsher sanctions against Iran. This demonization effort has been successful in that it has placed the US Congress firmly on the side of wrecking the Iranian economy as a means to eliminate Tehran’s nuclear program while prominent media spokesmen have been voicing much the same sentiment. Mitt Romney also drank the Kool aid, pledging to stop Iranian “capability” to create a nuclear weapon, something that it already has, before demonstrating that he did not even know where Iran was located. Because of the misinformation that circulates freely, opinion polls suggest that most Americans believe that Iran already has a nuclear weapon and constitutes a threat, though few would want a new war in the Middle East to deal with it.

But against the flood of propaganda the Pentagon and intelligence community to include former CIA and Defense Chief Robert Gates have been standing firm, stating unequivocally that a war with Iran would be a major mistake, almost certainly eclipsing the catastrophic Iraq misadventure in terms of its negative impact. The White House has muted the message, but it too has come down in favor of endless and pointless negotiations rather than initiating yet another armed conflict. So what does Israel think there is to gain?

And then there is also the Syria situation. Though many thoughtful Israelis initially opposed the European and American cheerleading for regime change in Damascus neoconservatives in the US have been gunning for Syria for a long time, starting with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) supported Syrian Accountability Act of 2003.

The demand that the Syrian government step down on humanitarian grounds, being supported by Republican and Democrat alike, ignores the likelihood that the situation might easily turn sour, as it did in Libya, producing a powerless government struggling to manage a gaggle of warring factions. Some of those factions would be keen to settle scores with Israel while others would be affiliated with al-Qaeda, which hitherto had no presence in Syria. Recently the Israeli government has followed the neocon lead, jumping on the bandwagon anddemanding that Bashar al-Assad should go.

The very first new “foreign policy” group to surface from the ashes of the Romney candidacy is The Foreign Policy Initiative (FPI). Its board of directors consists of William Kristol, Dan Senor, Eric Edelman, and Robert Kagan, none of whom has ever encountered a war against Muslims that they could not fully embrace even though none of them has ever worn a US military uniform. The expression “chickenhawk” has gone somewhat out of fashion, but it about sums it up. Senor, who was press spokesman for the disastrous Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq, also served as Mitt Romney’s principle adviser on the Middle East.

The FPI team is sponsoring a conference in Washington on Nov. 27 on the completely improbable if not ridiculous theme “The Price of Greatness: the Next Four Years of US Foreign Policy.” Senators Joe Lieberman and Jon Kyl are featured participants while France’s most assiduously self-promoting “public intellectual” Bernard-Henri Levy is one of the speakers on the subject of “The Consequences of Inaction in Syria.” Levy was, one recalls, a major cheerleader for intervention in Libya and he led the charge to defend director Roman Polanski, who drugged, raped and sodomized a thirteen year old girl in Los Angeles before fleeing to Switzerland, so he would appear to be well qualified to speak in front of a group founded by Bill Kristol.

If one goes to the group’swebsite, a featured headline is “Now is the time for a safe zone in Syria.” So Syria is now in the cross hairs, together with perennial favorite Iran. But what do the Israelis and their friends intend to accomplish?

I would argue that much of what the American public is seeing and hearing about Iran and Syria is a red herring. If the media is focused on developments in Syria and Iran it will be excusable not to pay any attention to what Israel is doing in its own backyard in what remains of Palestine. And Israel is most definitely up to its usual tricks on the West Bank. Benjamin Netanyahu has recently announced the building of 1,200 more housing units for Jews only in occupied East Jerusalem and on the West Bank.

If the Palestinians seek permanent observer member-state status in the United Nations at the end of this month, there have been suggestions that Israel will retaliate by building even more new settlements. The Israeli media is reporting a senior government official’s assertion that “If the Palestinians go to the UN, we won’t continue to show the restraint that we’ve demonstrated in terms of settlement construction.”

Restraint? Benjamin Netanyahu has no desire to see any viable Palestinian state and he has exploited the United States as an enabler in his commission of war crimes to stall any progress in that direction. When Israel was created it managed to seize control of 78% of the historic Palestine leaving only 22% to the Palestinian inhabitants. That 22% has now been reduced to less than 10% remaining on the West Bank plus Gaza. Israel is intent on colonizing the more desirable parts of the West Bank, crowding the remaining Palestinians into a cluster of Bantustans that will be “self-governing” though without any of the attributes of sovereignty.

The Arabs will not control their own water resources and airspace, will be hemmed in by Jews-only highways that they cannot use and military zones that they cannot enter, and will be prey to arbitrary action by the Israeli army to “protect” settlers and maintain security.

The Israelis appropriate Palestinian land as the wish to create new settlements and the rampaging settlers themselves destroy Palestinian farms and businesses so that the people will have no livelihood and will be forced to leave. All of the Israeli action is, of course, illegal in addition to being unconscionable as the Geneva Conventions consider it a war crime to seize and colonize land that has been occupied by military action. Israeli settlers on the West Bank have increased from 200,000 in 2000 and now number more than 350,000. They continue to increase, with settlements constituting42% of the West Bank.

If one adds in the 300,000 Jews living in Arab East Jerusalem and in the adjacent areas that have been illegally annexed to Israel proper, the total becomes 650,000 for Israeli Jews living in territories that were occupied in 1968. And there should be no confusion about the ultimate intentions of the Israeli government, which has secretly doubled its budget for settlement expansion. Hardliner Knesset member Yaakov Katz has predicted that “within four years,” there will be more than 1 million Jews living beyond the Green Line that once separated Jordan from Israel, and “then the revolution will be completed.”

Israelis have justified their continued annexation of Arab lands through various essentially racist rationalizations: the Palestinian government is not a fit partner for discussions, Arabs all want to exterminate Israelis, Muslims are not mentally capable of adapting to pluralistic democracy. As Mitt Romney summed up his understanding of the Israeli viewpoint, the Palestinians just do not want peace and are culturally incapable of becoming a successful political and economic entity.

Politically speaking, Israel is moving more sharply towards the right, something that will no doubt be confirmed with the reelection of Benjamin Netanyahu in January. Many Israelis do not consider themselves to be part of a democracy at all, except internally among the country’s Jewish population. It is an increasingly self-conscious Jewish state that exists only to benefit Jews, leading to talk of forcing Israeli Arabs to emigrate or denying them political rights.

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman has demanded that Israeli Arabs sign a loyalty oath to Israel as a Jewish state and he has also recommended that Arabs be stripped of their Israeli citizenship and expelled. Per a recent Haaretz article “86 percent of Israel’s Jewish citizens believe that decisions of major importance for the state must enjoy the support of a Jewish majority, while 62 percent of Israel’s Jewish citizens believe that as long as Israel is engaged in a conflict with the Palestinians, Arab citizens’ opinions on matters of security and foreign policy should not be taken into account.”

Understanding that Israel’s real agenda is not to fight Iran or do anything to help stabilize Syria and accepting instead that Benjamin Netanyahu intends to expand and solidify a Greater Israel provides some clarity to developments in the Middle East. Palestinians living between the Mediterranean and the Jordan River in Israel, Gaza, and on the West Bank will in twelve years constitute a majority of the indigenous population, but they will be a majority forced into ever contracting enclaves and hemmed in by Israeli force majeure on all sides.

It is not a pleasant prospect, being somewhat akin to the sputtering bomb cartoon that Netanyahu produced in the United Nations. Unfortunately, only the United States can influence the Israelis to rethink their destructive policies, which will ultimately also do grave damage to the American people, but there is no sign that any US politician has the courage to face the facts and do what is right.

NOVANEWS

Ask an awkward question, get a silly answer: “Israel is a non-nuclear weapons state”

Tired of listening to Agent Cameron and his foreign secretary, William Hague, trying to pick a fight with Iran and ratcheting up sanctions aimed at ruining that country’s economy and hurting innocent Iranian women and children, I asked my MP, Henry Bellingham, to table the following written Parliamentary Question:

Israel refuses (unlike Iran) to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and open its nuclear programme to international inspection. It has not signed the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention. It has signed but not ratified the Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty, similarly the Chemical Weapons Convention. The Israeli regime continues to defy international law and UN resolutions with its illegal occupation, ongoing confiscation of Palestinian lands, destruction of homes, arrest and imprisonment of civilians, its inhuman blockade of Gaza and many other crimes against humanity – including lethal assaults on peaceful shipping on the high seas bringing humanitarian aid. Instead of rewarding Israel with pledges of everlasting protection and special trade agreements, should not Britain and the international community now discharge their obligation to make Israel accountable?

Mr Bellingham said he would have to “tweak” the question, presumably to fit the approved format. In the process the emphasis on Israel’s nuclear, biological and chemical weapons of mass destruction was mysteriously lost. This was the result…

Mr Bellingham:To ask the secretary of state for foreign and commonwealth affairs what steps he is taking to encourage Israel to (a) sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and (b) open its nuclear programme to international inspection. [126611]

Alistair Burt:The British government supports fully the universalization of the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT). We have called on Israel and other non-signatories to join the NPT as non-nuclear weapons states. We have also called on them to agree a full scope Comprehensive Safeguards Agreement with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). In 2009 the IAEA concluded that nuclear material, facilities or other items to which safeguards were applied in Israel remained in use for peaceful activities. The UK accepts these conclusions. We have a regular dialogue with the Israeli government on civil nuclear and counter proliferation issues. [my italics]

What does Mr Burt, the parliamentary under-secretary of state for foreign and commonwealth affairs, mean by including Israel among the “non-nuclear weapons states”? Is he seriously telling Parliament and the world that Israel has no nukes?

Misleading Parliament is a serious offence. The Foreign Office minister ought to withdraw any suggestion that Israel has no nuclear weapons.

He sidesteps the taboo subject of Israel’s hundreds of nuclear warheads, which have never been subject to international safeguards, while he and his colleagues enjoy their sport of punishing Iran, which is properly signed up to the NPT and has no nuclear weapons.

Burt, being a former officer of the lobby group Conservative Friends of Israel, is a rabid admirer and supporter of that racist entity, as are Hague and Cameron. All three, according toTheyWorkForYou.com, voted “very strongly” for the Iraq war which, for the majority of the British public, was the acid test of how far they can be trusted in government.

My understanding of the Israeli nukes situation is that in 2009 the IAEA again called on Israel to join the Non-Proliferation Treaty, open its nuclear facilities to inspection and place them under comprehensive IAEA safeguards. And again Israel declined.

The IAEA applies safeguards in Israel pursuant to an INFCIRC/66-type safeguards agreement of 4 April 1975 concluded between the IAEA, Israel and the United States of America (INFCIRC/249) which was extended by a Protocol of 28 September 1977 (INFCIRC/249/Add.1). The Agreement relates to an agreement of 12 July 1955 on the peaceful uses of nuclear energy between the governments of Israel and the USA. Israel has not concluded an Additional Protocol to its safeguards agreement.

The IAEA’s verification of Israel’s activities, unlike those of states with a comprehensive safeguards agreement, is limited to the materials, equipment and facilities Israel chooses to specify in its safeguards undertakings. The IAEA concluded in 2009 that the items specified by Israel were for peaceful purposes but made clear that it was unable to list all the nuclear facilities which could be subject of safeguards if a comprehensive agreement were in force.

Quite obviously, in the case of Israel the IAEA’s monitoring has been woefully insufficient. On 7 April 2010 the director-general wrote to all IAEA member states, including Israel, about a resolution adopted by the General Conference on 18 September 2009. The letter said the resolution expressed concern about Israeli nuclear capabilities and called on Israel “to accede to the NPT and place all its nuclear facilities under comprehensive IAEA safeguards”. It also urged the IAEA director-general to work with the concerned states towards achieving that end and report on the implementation of this resolution to the Board of Governors and the General Conference.

Israel’s foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, in his response, called the resolution “politically motivated” and said it attempted to divert attention from the real proliferation challenges of the Middle East, namely non-compliance by Iran and Syria with their NPT obligations. According to him, the resolution was incompatible with basic principles and norms of international law. “It is the sovereign right of any state to decide whether it consents to be bound by any particular treaty,” he wrote.

Imagine if Iran had said that!

While claiming that Israel values the non-proliferation regime and acknowledges its importance, Lieberman said that “attempts to single out Israel … harm the professional standing of the IAEA” and that cooperation with the resolution was “unjustified”. He wanted it removed from the IAEA’s agenda.

Misleading Parliament is a serious offence. The Foreign Office minister ought to withdraw any suggestion that Israel has no nuclear weapons. I have asked Mr Bellingham to obtain a much fuller reply addressing the weapons issue. He says he will “see what further question can sensibly come out of this and table it in due course”.

A second Parliamentary Question, asking why the British government hasn’t made friends and developed trade with Iran instead of declaring economic war and plotting a shooting war, seems to have gone missing.

It’s all so reminiscent of the unpleasantness in 1953 when Dr Mossadeq refused to do Britain’s bidding. Will we never learn?

I imagine I am not the only one who feels the need to vomit (dictionary definition: “to throw up the contents of the stomach through the mouth”) when Israel’s Goebbels justifies the Zionist state’s ferocious and monstrously disproportionate attacks by air and sea on the Israeli-blockaded Gaza Strip, the prison camp which is home to 1.8 million besieged and mainly impoverished Palestinians.

The Israeli to whom I am referring is, of course, Australian-born Mark Regev, the prime minister’s spokesman, for which read spin doctor. The more I see and hear him in action, the more it seems to me that he makes Nazi Germany’s propaganda chief look like an amateur.

In a piece for the Observer on 6 June 2010, Ruth Sutherland wrote the following.

If the men from Mars ever wanted to manufacture a PR man, they would model their robot on Regev. No matter how formidable the interviewer, or how aggressive the questioning, he never buckles under pressure. His disarming Aussie accent and unfailing politeness – he calls interviewers “Sir” and uses phrases like “I beg to disagree” – almost lulls listeners into overlooking his aggression. He is always regretful about death and horror – he regrets that the non-Israeli victims brought their fate on themselves. Viewers are reduced to a trance of slack-jawed amazement at what he is prepared to say with a straight face. He is unlikely to win sceptics to Israel’s cause, but as a PR performer he is horribly compelling.

Compelling he certainly is but, as Sutherland indicated (I will be more explicit), only to Westerners and Americans in particular who have been conditioned for decades by Zionist propaganda and, as a consequence, know nothing or little worth knowing about the truth of history as it relates to the making and sustaining of the conflict in and over Palestine that became Israel.

In the immediate aftermath of Israel’s targeted assassination of Hamas’s military commander, Ahmed Jabari, Regev was at his best. His main message to the Western nations, conveyed via the BBC and many other networks, was that Israel is just like them – democratic and civilized. “I would ask them all,” he said, “how would you act?” (respond to rocket fire from “terrorists”). By obvious implication, he was saying something very like, “You would take all necessary action against the terrorists to defend and protect your people, and that’s why I am sure you will understand and support what we are doing.”

…Israel is not like the Western nations. It is a brutal occupying power, and the cause of the incoming rockets is its occupation and on-going colonization and ethnic cleansing of the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and its blockade of the Gaza Strip.

The flaw in that presentation is that Israel is notlike the Western nations. It is a brutal occupying power, and the cause of the incoming rockets is its occupation and on-going colonization and ethnic cleansing of the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and its blockade of the Gaza Strip. That plus the fact that Israel’s leaders have no interest in peace on terms the Palestinians could accept.

Regev also appealed for Western understanding and support on the grounds that “they” (Hamas) say my country should be wiped off the map”.

That’s one of the many big, fat Zionist propaganda lies. The truth is that Hamas is firmly on the record with the statement that while it will never recognize Israel’s right to exist, it is prepared to live in peace with an Israel inside its 1967 borders.

Regev’s master, Binyamin Netanyahu, was also up to his old tricks – diverting attention. He played the Iranian nuclear threat card to get Palestine off the international community’s agenda. With Israel’s next election less than 70 days away, one of his reasons for authorizing Operation Pillar of Defence was, as a report in The Times of Israel put it, “to divert public discourse from social justice to security issues and silence the government’s critics”.

Netanyahu obviously believes that by way of deception he can not only retain power but emerge from Israel’s next election with more power than ever. (Enough to tell Obama to go to hell if that ever becomes necessary).

The support (by default if not design) of Western governments for Israel’s latest ferocious and monstrously disproportionate attacks also makes me want to vomit.

Qaisi’s predecessor was killed by an Israeli assassination last August in an Israeli strike which left 6 dead, including a 3 year old child. The Israelis claimed an attack that came from Sinai on Eilat had originated in Gaza. This seemed suspicious at the time. The Eilat attack was well coordinated and beyond what anyone estimated to be the operational capabilities of a small faction like the PRC. Sure enough, we later learned the IDF acknowledged that Egyptian Beduin perpetrated the attack.

It was easier and less politically costly for the Israelis to retaliate against Gaza since nobody seems to ask questions when Israelis kill Palestinians in Gaza – its become routine. Had they struck at Egypt however, they would have to calculate the unknown variable of a revolutionary Egypt’s reaction. Gaza was the more convenientplace to go for revenge. Israeli journalist Amira Hassnoted at the time how no signs in Gaza pointed to local responsibility for the attacks.

Let us grant for the sake of argument that Qaisi was planning an attack, the timing of the Israeli assassination was still elected and not forced since, as the Israelis admit, Qaisi was not an imminent threat.

This begs the question; Why would the Israeli government take an action which they know would immediately provoke a response putting more Israelis at risk than if they would not have. The Israelis claim to have had detailed intelligence to justify the assassination of Qaisi so wouldn’t it make more sense to use that information to defend Israeli interests without provoking a response that would bring a barrage of projectile file? Of course it would, but that is not the course of action the Israelis chose.

It seems as though they wanted to provoke a response. But why? Why would the Israeli government put Israelis at risk when this was entirely avoidably? (Of course, they ultimately put Palestinians at risk the most but the Israeli government has never been all too concerned about that anyway)

It may be because something happened on the way to AIPAC. While Netanyahu and his Israel Lobby friends have done a very good job of convincing members of Congress to support an Israeli strike on Iran, there is one audience that is significantly less convinced and less gung-ho; Israelis.

From a poll that was released immediately before the AIPAC conference (obviously intentional timing) we learned that the Israeli public and their Prime Minister are not on the same page. Shibley Telhamiwrites about the poll conducted with the Israeli Dahaf Institute at the end of February 2012:

Only 19 percent of Israelis polled expressed support for an attack without U.S. backing, according to a poll I conducted — fielded by Israel’s Dahaf Institute Feb. 22-26 — while 42 percent endorsed a strike only if there is at least U.S. support, and 32 percent opposed an attack regardless.

This does not appear to be because of Israeli worries about potential American punishment. In fact, Israelis remain confident the U.S. would support them, at least diplomatically (38 percent), or join the war on Israel’s behalf (27 percent) — even if Israel struck Iran without Washington’s approval. Only 15 percent expect reduced American support. What seems behind these attitudes is an assessment of the consequences of an Israeli attack.

A majority of Israelis polled, roughly 51 percent, said the war would last months (29 percent) or years (22 percent), while only 18 percent said it would last days. About as many Israelis, 44 percent, think that an Israeli strike would actually strengthen Iran’s government as think it would weaken it (45 percent).

Two-thirds of Israelis, meanwhile, believe Hezbollah would most likely join Iran in retaliation against Israel — even if Israel did not strike Hezbollah forces. An additional 27 percent believe Hezbollah would join only if attacked.

So here is Netanyahu, putting all his effort and focus toward saber rattling, and his public isn’t going along. Netanyahu would not likely carry out an attack that his public is against and Iran and the US know that electoral constraints would mean even the most belligerent rhetoric isn’t likely to be backed up with action if it will cost a leader his office. The greatest obstacle to Israeli public support for a unilateral Israeli strike on Iran is the belief that the consequences of the attack from Iran, Hezbollah and other factions like Islamic Jihad, would be too high a cost to bear.

What could the Israeli government do to change this perception? Well, a successful large scale live action test of the US funded Iron Dome would probably help, and assassinating a PRC militant would provoke the projectiles to trigger one.

As the ‘Iron Dome’ (which can also refer to Israel’s hard-headed policy toward Gaza) was put into use, Israelirightwing publications openly favoring belligerency toward Iran happily reported on the success of the system. Israeli publications that have been less hawkish on Iran took a different approach.

Haaretz’s Aluf Benn picks up on on how Netanyahu is “preparing Israeli public opinion for war on Iran” yet somehow fails to even mention Gaza in his piece, let alone ask the obvious question about whether shaping Israeli public opinion toward war could explain the inexplicable Israeli decision making behind provoking projectile fire from Gaza.

27 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza and 80 more injured from Israeli fire after the assassination of Qaisi.

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